Category Archives: Donald Trump

Tanzania’s president shrugs off Covid-19 risk after sending fruit for ‘tests’

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Magufuli caused alarm by branding lab tests a ‘dirty game’ and hailing natural remedies. Now he is calling for country to open up

Tanzania’s divisive president John Magufuli has said the economy is “more important than the threat posed by coronavirus”, adding that he wants to reopen the country for tourism despite warnings that Africa could face the next wave of the disease.

The comments by Magufuli, who has modelled his populist response on that of Donald Trump and Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro – in repeatedly denying the risk of the pandemic to his country – come amid mounting alarm among Tanzania’s neighbours over his approach.

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‘If it was me, they would do it’: Trump reacts to dismissed ‘Obamagate’ investigation – video

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After US attorney general William Barr dismissed the possibility of investigating 'Obamagate', president Donald Trump responded 'If it was me, they would do it'. The president has called 'Obamagate': "The biggest political crime in American history, by far!" However Trump has failed to detail his exact accusations

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Trump says he’s taking hydroxychloroquine against Covid-19 despite FDA warnings

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President says he’s been taking drug for ‘a couple of weeks’ but FDA has issued repeated warning about the dangers of the drug

Donald Trump has told reporters at the White House that for “a couple weeks” he has been taking a malaria drug as a defense against Covid-19 – despite warnings from his administration that it is dangerous.

Trump said he was taking hydroxychloroquine – a drug approved to treat malaria, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis – in response to the coronavirus threat.

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Coronavirus: Trump claims he takes hydroxychloroquine despite FDA warnings – video

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Donald Trump claimed he has been taking hydroxychloroquine to prevent Covid-19, despite no compelling evidence that the drug is effective against the coronavirus.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned against using hydroxychloroquine or a related compound, chloroquine, for treating or preventing Covid-19 unless under medical supervision in a hospital or as part of a clinical trial

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Trump sons provoke outrage with baseless attacks on Biden and lockdown

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  • Donald Trump Jr says pedophile allusion was ‘joking around’
  • Eric Trump claims coronavirus is a political hoax

Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump, the US president’s oldest sons, have attracted fierce criticism for attacking Joe Biden and Democrats in terms most observers considered beyond the pale even in America’s toxic political climate.

Related: ‘They don’t give him enough credit’: the voters who back Trump, even through the pandemic

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Democrats feel tide turning their way in battle to flip US Senate

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The electoral map does not favor Republicans and the pandemic has helped put them on defense in states they once thought safe

Just three months ago, centrist Democrats were panicking. After strong performances in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada, the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders appeared poised to sail away with the nomination for president. Some in the party feared the self-identified democratic socialist would wreak havoc down the ballot.

Related: Could Susan Collins' vote for Kavanaugh help the Democrats flip the Senate in 2020?

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Jesse Jackson: ‘The gated community does not protect you from the pandemic’

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After more than 50 years fighting for civil rights, the activist is now watching coronavirus ravage African American communities. But he has a warning for the rich and powerful

The Rev Jesse Jackson was born in the racially segregated south when Franklin Roosevelt occupied the White House and war raged in Europe. He was an eyewitness to the assassination of Martin Luther King, campaigned against the Vietnam war and twice ran for US president.

But, now an elder statesman of 78, he has never seen anything like the coronavirus pandemic, which has infected more than 1 million Americans and killed more in April alone than died in Vietnam over 15 years. The world’s most powerful and wealthy country also bears by far its biggest death toll: almost 90,000. It is enough to shake faith in American exceptionalism.

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Trump accuses Obama of being ‘grossly incompetent’ after his coronavirus criticism

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Former president rebuked Trump administration’s response to pandemic, which has killed almost 90,000 Americans so far

Donald Trump has hit back at Barack Obama’s criticism of his administration’s handling of the coronavirus crisis, accusing the former US president of being “grossly incompetent” during his time in office.

Related: Barack Obama attacks Trump administration's response to coronavirus pandemic

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Trump accuses Obama of ‘gross incompetence’ – video

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Donald Trump has given his first public response to Barack Obama’s criticism of the current administration’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. 'Look, he was an incompetent president, that’s all I can say. Grossly incompetent,' said Trump when asked about Obama's comments on Sunday

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Sanders says his supporters will vote for Biden but he needs to court them

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Sanders: Biden should focus on student debt relief, health insurance coverage, a living wage, climate change and racism

Former Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has said he thinks his supporters will vote for Joe Biden in November’s US election, despite a former aide’s warning that Biden was not consolidating Sanders supporters.

In a memo released last week, former Sanders adviser Jeff Weaver said Sanders supporters were “currently unsupportive and unenthusiastic” about Biden and “there is a real and urgent need to help Biden consolidate Sanders supporters”.

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‘William Barr is not done’: experts raise concerns about attorney general’s legal reach

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Former justice department officials and legal experts have pointed to Barr’s intervention in cases involving Trump associates

Legal experts and and alumnae of the US Department of Justice have begun sounding the alarm about Donald Trump’s attorney general, William Barr.

Recently Barr’s justice department withdrew charges against Michael Flynn, the former Trump administration national security adviser who pleaded guilty to lying to federal law enforcement officials about his dealings with Russia’s ambassador over sanctions, just before Trump took office.

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Trump, Putin and Bolsonaro have been complacent. Now the pandemic has made them all vulnerable

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The world’s strongmen may well end up paying a political price for their cynicism and incompetence

If Boris Johnson is mishandling the pandemic, he is not alone. Falsely claiming everything is under control, dodging responsibility, hiding from public view, exploiting the crisis for political gain, mounting artificial distractions and blaming the media: these are common behaviour patterns exhibited by some of the world’s most powerful – and shifty – leaders.

Will they pay a price for their lethal incompetence and cynicism? It’s possible some will, though it may take a while. The pandemic is changing political calculations around the globe. Leaders who looked invulnerable suddenly appear less so. That in turn could shift the strategic calculus and alter the balance of power between countries in ways both unexpected and permanent.

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Putin, Johnson, Bolsonaro and Trump: men too macho for masks

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Why leaders who want to be seen as strongmen are afraid to take Covid-19 safety precautions

With the news this week that Vladimir Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, is in hospital with Covid-19, the virus has now penetrated the Kremlin, 10 Downing Street, the Palácio do Planalto and the White House.

Putin, Boris Johnson, Jair Bolsonaro and Donald Trump are all very different politicians. But all have had one thing in common in their responses to coronavirus: a belief or suggestion, at least in the early stages, that taking personal protective measures against the virus is somehow unseemly and at odds with their macho political brands.

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Barack Obama attacks Trump administration’s response to coronavirus pandemic

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Former president breaks tradition of refraining from criticism of successor, while also highlighting the high-profile killing of Ahmaud Arbery

Barack Obama has attacked the Trump administration’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic during speeches to graduating students.

The comments on Saturday were a rare rebuke of a sitting president from one of his predecessors, and come in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 88,000 people in the United States, a death toll far higher than any other country, and had devastating and disproportionate effects on communities of color.

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Trump says US is developing a ‘super duper’ missile – video

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Unveiling the flag for his new space force, Donald Trump said the US was developing a 'super-duper missile' to outpace its military adversaries. 'We have no choice, we have to do it with the adversaries we have out there. We have, I call it the super duper missile and I heard the other night [it’s] 17 times faster than what they have right now,' the US president said on Friday

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‘It eats him alive inside’: Trump’s latest attack shows endless obsession with Obama

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The president seems more interested in blaming his predecessor than tackling the coronavirus – so what’s driving Trump’s fixation?

President Barack Obama and President-elect Donald Trump once sat together in the Oval Office. “I was immediately struck by Trump’s body language,” wrote journalist Jon Karl in his memoir Front Row at The Trump Show. “I was seeing a side of him I had never seen. He seemed, believe it or not, humbled.”

Related: Trump campaign focuses fire on Biden as pandemic undermines strategy

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‘Perhaps you should look into it’: Kayleigh McEnany dodges Obamagate question – video

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During a press briefing, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany was asked why Donald Trump accused Barack Obama of committing a crime this week and asked her to name the crime. After listing issues with people in office while Obama was president, she said it was reporters' responsibility to 'answer the question' of what Obama did that was against the law. She ignored the reporter pointing out it is the White House press secretary’s duty to respond to questions about something the president said

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Trump unveils ‘warp-speed’ effort to create coronavirus vaccine by year’s end

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Donald Trump has announced details of a “warp-speed” effort to create a coronavirus vaccine by the end of the year, even as experts warn that such a breakthrough could take longer than 18 months.

Related: Coronavirus US live: Trump's press conference disrupted by trucker protest

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‘That’s the sign of love’: Trump claims truckers’ disruptive honking is ‘in favour’ of him – video

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Trucking industry protesters disrupted a press briefing in the White House rose garden on Friday by honking their horns. Donald Trump said the sound was truckers ‘showing support’, but the honking may have been a protest. Earlier this month, the Washington Post reported that a convoy of trucks in Washington DC blasted their air horns to protest against low shipping rates, which truckers say threaten their livelihoods

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Trump campaign focuses fire on Biden as pandemic undermines strategy

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With few positive messages available, advisers have launched a multi-pronged attack on the former vice-president

Donald Trump had planned to run on a pledge to “Keep America great”. But with a global pandemic claiming the lives of more than 85,000 Americans and causing economic devastation, the slogan does not seem to hold the same promise it did at the start of the year – even for his most ardent fans.

In a recently released campaign ad titled American Comeback, the president instead returned to the “Make America great again” slogan that first brought him to power and whose Maga initials have become global shorthand for Trumpism and its adherents.

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